The end of history
Did you catch this piece in The New York Times last weekend? A new psychological study has come out that examines our perceptions about just how much we change over a lifetime. Apparently people significantly underestimate how different their future selves will be.
The article quotes Daniel T. Gilbert, one of the authors of the study, on the phenomenon: “Middle-aged people — like me — often look back on our teenage selves with some mixture of amusement and chagrin… What we never seem to realize is that our future selves will look back and think the very same thing about us. At every age we think we’re having the last laugh, and at every age we’re wrong.”
Scientists have dubbed the illusion “the end of history.” The article has some interesting reporting on why we underestimate how much we’ll change, and how this affects our lives.
Photo by Irina Werning.
